Doctor Who Season 6 Thus Far - Two Points of Discussion and My Postition on SPOILERS
I have a couple of things I want to discuss about recent Doctor Who episodes but first I want to come out quite strongly on the side of SPOILERS and the freedom of fans to talk about them. I know that Moffat (and RTD before him) HATES them and thinks it's vandalism for the information to get out there before the episode. (See his recent rant about spoilers for proof. *g*) We are all ruining the plot twists for ourselves! And that is The Best Thing about the episodes. I guess...at least accorded to Moffat. I personally have been going mostly spoiler free for Doctor Who this year (you always see something just by looking at news reports) but I frequently will read an entire recap or detailed review just before watching an episode of other shows. And, you know what? That makes me happy. I don't like suspense (I also read the ends of books); I am more about the journey than the surprises. However, I'm also all about not spoiling other people! That is one thing I like about lj and about well moderated forums: the spoilers are marked and sequestered so no one has to see them if they don't want to.
One other note: Moffat is worried about fans spoiling but what about news organizations and the damn trailers? Long clips, spoilery pictures, and discussion of upcoming plots are all over the media. I have had more plot twists that I wanted to be surprised for spoiled in the trailers! I'm not always against suspense and surprise in a show but the people who put to together show trailers seem to be. Right now I'm thinking of a big plot twist coming up on Body of Proof that is IN THE TRAILER and I'm still upset at a BSG trailer that showed a CHARACTER DEATH. I mean really! *grumbles about trailers some more*
Okay. Onto discussion of plot points and themes in the first episodes of season 6! Need I say spoilers for these episodes? *g* None for anything after Curse of the Black Spot though.
Point 1. So far I haven't really talked about what the Doctor did in Day of the Moon. I mean he Turned the Human Race Into Mindless Killers. This took some mulling over on my part! While I was mulling I did read a number of interesting, thoughtful, and passionate posts on the subject so for a bit I was all 'this latest post that I read is exactly right!' for each post in turn. I was getting dizzy!
For my part I think that this an extremely dark thing for the Doctor to do. It isn't presented as dark -- Eleven isn't shown to wrestle with the decision but rather to be rather light hearted about it -- but to basically program any person who sees the moon launch to kill Silents on sight is DARK. As a solution is it rather ingenious; how do you fight an enemy that you can't even remember when you're not looking at it? And one that can perform a sort of post-hypnotic suggestion on you? You turn it around on them. But the solution has the result of turning any human on Earth into a possible killer. It doesn't matter if they are pacifists or would not have chosen (given all necessary information) to do this; they will at least attempt to kill any Silent they see. This is extremely WRONG, but also INTERESTING. I like dark stories and moral grey zones. That is the sort of tv which appeals to me so long as the darkness is explored. If all of this is glossed over, I will be less impressed with it all.
However, Eleven's plan is not genocide. It is potential genocide which might be bad enough, but, assuming this programming is effective in killing Silents (a very big if), it is more of a way to throw the Silents off of Earth by making it dangerous for them to stay. The thing is, how effective is this going to be? How many people will have a weapon in their hand when they see a Silent and how many would be killed by the Silent's lightening hands? And how angry are the Silents going to be once they are kicked off of Earth? Ten talked about how anything he does just makes it happen and here is Eleven going down the same path. He creates himself.
Point 2. I get the feeling that Curse of the Black Spot is going to end up being both a not so good episode from a plot standpoint and also the episode which brings forward the season's themes so that you end up referring to the episode when talking about the season as whole. (See Boomtown in s1 and The Doctor's Daughter in s4 for previous versions of this.) The plot is basically nonsensical and could have used a few more rewrites but the episode does make clear that we are talking about a theme of doubling/mirroring. (two ships, two stars, mirrors everywhere) Moffat loves playing with time loops and time travel so it is not surprising that he has decided to create a season with two intersecting time lines.
How can Amy be pregnant and not pregnant? How can River's time line be all twisted with the Doctor's and all linear? By having two time lines of course! *g* Based on River it seems as though the time lines split when the Doctor died in the Impossible Astronaut, though it may have happened last season with the rewriting of the universe. Or the split could have echoed back, or echoed forward from Rory's death and resurrection. It will be interesting to see how this gets solved, and I HOPE it gets solved this season! It's bad enough that we'll have to wait for a mid-season break but going more that a couple of seasons with an twisty, complicated plot tends to have showrunners losing sight of where they are. (Yes, BSG I'm looking at you.)
This entry was originally posted here and has
comments. Comment here or there.
One other note: Moffat is worried about fans spoiling but what about news organizations and the damn trailers? Long clips, spoilery pictures, and discussion of upcoming plots are all over the media. I have had more plot twists that I wanted to be surprised for spoiled in the trailers! I'm not always against suspense and surprise in a show but the people who put to together show trailers seem to be. Right now I'm thinking of a big plot twist coming up on Body of Proof that is IN THE TRAILER and I'm still upset at a BSG trailer that showed a CHARACTER DEATH. I mean really! *grumbles about trailers some more*
Okay. Onto discussion of plot points and themes in the first episodes of season 6! Need I say spoilers for these episodes? *g* None for anything after Curse of the Black Spot though.
Point 1. So far I haven't really talked about what the Doctor did in Day of the Moon. I mean he Turned the Human Race Into Mindless Killers. This took some mulling over on my part! While I was mulling I did read a number of interesting, thoughtful, and passionate posts on the subject so for a bit I was all 'this latest post that I read is exactly right!' for each post in turn. I was getting dizzy!
For my part I think that this an extremely dark thing for the Doctor to do. It isn't presented as dark -- Eleven isn't shown to wrestle with the decision but rather to be rather light hearted about it -- but to basically program any person who sees the moon launch to kill Silents on sight is DARK. As a solution is it rather ingenious; how do you fight an enemy that you can't even remember when you're not looking at it? And one that can perform a sort of post-hypnotic suggestion on you? You turn it around on them. But the solution has the result of turning any human on Earth into a possible killer. It doesn't matter if they are pacifists or would not have chosen (given all necessary information) to do this; they will at least attempt to kill any Silent they see. This is extremely WRONG, but also INTERESTING. I like dark stories and moral grey zones. That is the sort of tv which appeals to me so long as the darkness is explored. If all of this is glossed over, I will be less impressed with it all.
However, Eleven's plan is not genocide. It is potential genocide which might be bad enough, but, assuming this programming is effective in killing Silents (a very big if), it is more of a way to throw the Silents off of Earth by making it dangerous for them to stay. The thing is, how effective is this going to be? How many people will have a weapon in their hand when they see a Silent and how many would be killed by the Silent's lightening hands? And how angry are the Silents going to be once they are kicked off of Earth? Ten talked about how anything he does just makes it happen and here is Eleven going down the same path. He creates himself.
Point 2. I get the feeling that Curse of the Black Spot is going to end up being both a not so good episode from a plot standpoint and also the episode which brings forward the season's themes so that you end up referring to the episode when talking about the season as whole. (See Boomtown in s1 and The Doctor's Daughter in s4 for previous versions of this.) The plot is basically nonsensical and could have used a few more rewrites but the episode does make clear that we are talking about a theme of doubling/mirroring. (two ships, two stars, mirrors everywhere) Moffat loves playing with time loops and time travel so it is not surprising that he has decided to create a season with two intersecting time lines.
How can Amy be pregnant and not pregnant? How can River's time line be all twisted with the Doctor's and all linear? By having two time lines of course! *g* Based on River it seems as though the time lines split when the Doctor died in the Impossible Astronaut, though it may have happened last season with the rewriting of the universe. Or the split could have echoed back, or echoed forward from Rory's death and resurrection. It will be interesting to see how this gets solved, and I HOPE it gets solved this season! It's bad enough that we'll have to wait for a mid-season break but going more that a couple of seasons with an twisty, complicated plot tends to have showrunners losing sight of where they are. (Yes, BSG I'm looking at you.)
This entry was originally posted here and has
comments. Comment here or there.